Stingless bees process honey and pollen in cerumen pots

Patricia Vit

 David W Roubik

Editors

Stingless bees process honey and pollen in cerumen pots

Las abejas sin aguijón procesan miel y polen en potes de cerumen

As abelhas sem ferrão processam mel e pólen em potes de cerúmen

Facultad de Farmacia y Bioanálisis

Universidad de Los Andes

iii

 Stingless bees process honey and pollen in cerumen pots

Patricia Vit

David W Roubik

1ª Edición Julio 2013

Colección “Museo Gota de Miel”

Editor

institucional

Facultad de Farmacia y Bioanálisis

Universidad de Los Andes

Mérida,

Venezuela

Fotografía en la portada

Leurotrigona muelleri (reina, entrada, cámara de cría, reservas de miel y de polen)

Cristiano

Menezes

Diseño de portada

María Eugenia Hernández

SABER-ULA

Diseño y diagramación

Patricia

Vit

Hecho el Depósito de Ley

Depósito Legal LF lfi

2372013615143

ISBN:

978-980-11-1551-9

Dedicado a la madre naturaleza

y a la madre de las ciencias

v

Foreword

It is with some trepidation that I put pen to paper in an effort to produce a suitable prologue for this collection of works. As a relative newcomer to stingless bee research I felt I did not qualify for such a privilege. However, upon reflection, I may be just the right representative to complete this task and it is my honor to do so.

The information contained within these pages, albeit in very modern, electronic pages, has been put together by some of the most respected, experienced, knowledgeable and devoted stingless bee keepers and researchers in the world. It is only through their dedication that new researchers, such as myself, are able to access information pertaining to these wondrous creatures.

Of the 21 chapters in this book, seven are written in Spanish, and two in Portuguese, the native language of the author(s). This, in itself, demonstrates the value of this e-book. Through the wonders of modern technology we are able to receive information written in foreign languages by simply copying and pasting sections of text into online translators. Previously unattainable knowledge, acquired by those who work intimately with stingless bees, is now available to all those who have access to a computer. One chapter, written in Spanish, is a tribute to the late Professor João Maria Franco de Camargo, and tells of the meticulous and unerring work carried out on 88 species of bees, collected over a twenty-year period. The author gives insights into the reasons behind the names assigned to some of the species and portrays Camargo’s love for the study and illustration of these remarkable bees.

The authors of the chapters within this book share the product of their love for and dedication to stingless bees in their respective fields of expertise. This includes the geological and cultural histories of stingless bees, their use in education, and the importance of stingless bee farming (meliponiculture) to rural communities and to bee conservation. In South America, the production of pot-honey, through meliponiculture, is growing; however, regulation of the quality of the end product is lacking. Here, a draft proposal is put forward as a guide for legislation of quality and safety standards in commercial Melipona honey. Pot-honey analysis is providing information on the geographical location of important floral sources, as well as resource preferences by foragers and the behavioral traits associated with these resources. Pot-honey can also be used as a bio-indicator of environmental health and levels of air pollution. The medicinal properties of pot-honey have become apparent with the development of honey therapies for wound management, antioxidant therapy and in oncology. The vagaries and complexities associated with taxonomic practices in stingless bee classification are also addressed. That was a good academic underpinning of some very complex phenomena.

I hope you enjoy sharing the information within these pages as much as I have.

Megan Halcroft Bees Business, Blaxland, New South Wales, Australia

Prologue

Stingless bees now and in the future

Bee keeping with honey bees (Apis mellifera) has played an important role in tropical, more sustainable development programs during recent years, mainly because the net profits from labor in conventional honey production are high compared to other agricultural activities. However, honey bee keeping is not always advisable in protected areas, and of course in the New World tropics, where honey bees are introduced, a long history and unique tradition surrounds the keeping of the native stingless bees (Meliponini). The latter cultural practice is also known from the Old World where it has existed for centuries, in parallel with the more common keeping of honey bees.

Stingless bees include a large number of different tropical and some subtropical species. As in honey bees, they form social colonies and provision their nests with honey and pollen, which are stored in pots made of beewax or cerumen. Although more species are expected to be found and described, the known worldwide diversity is presently 526 species: 411 in the New World and 115 in the Old World distributed as follows: 19 in Africa, 7 in Madagascar, and 89 in southeast Asia and Australia. Camargo and Pedro (2007) and Rasmussen (2008) provide all published references available on the taxonomy and biology of the stingless bees from those regions, thus making it relatively easy to acquire an overview, or background information, of what is already known and what needs to be studied and reported for each species. When it comes to evolutionary or comparative studies, stingless bees are also an excellent study organism for understanding advanced sociality, feeding specialization, and adaptive value of different nesting strategies. Both higher-level and some species-level molecular phylogenies are available for some groups (Ramírez et al., 2010; Rasmussen and Camargo, 2008; Rasmussen and Cameron, 2007; Rasmussen and Cameron, 2010) as are morphology-based phylogenies (e.g., Camargo and Pedro, 2003, Camargo and Pedro 2004, Gonzalez and Roubik, 2008).

The taxonomic knowledge of stingless bees is still limited in various groups and regions. Even for genera that have been subject to taxonomic study in recent years, there is always a chance of encountering undescribed species, because the melittofauna in many regions is still poorly sampled or known. Furthermore, some commonly encountered genera have never been revised and their species-level identification is, unfortunately, impossible without the careful examination of museum specimens, which are often located in many different countries. Even the species status, or species concept, of some remain to be clarified, including that of a few common species that are heavily used by rural communities and widely studied across the Neotropics. For example, the bee called Tetragonisca angustula (Latreille) is a common bee kept in hives, which ranges from Mexico to Argentina. It is probably composed of several undescribed species (Camargo and Pedro, 2007). Such taxonomic problems for a diverse and culturally and economic important group of bees translates into nomenclatural instability, which becomes an annoyance for non-taxonomists and confounds any comparative evolutionary or behavioral study. Chapter 11 discusses some of these issues.

Most of the stingless bee fauna of Central America can be identified with the taxonomic keys to species of Mexico (Ayala, 1999) and Panama (Roubik, 1992). The higher diversity in South America is more difficult to identify correctly, but many species can be identified using the available taxonomic revisions, and following the assignment to genus (an excellent generic key is Silveira et al., 2002), with keys such as those by JMF Camargo, JS Moure, SRM Pedro, and even the older keys by HF Schwarz. Afrotropical stingless bees can be identified with the taxonomic key of Eardley (2004), except for those from

vii

Madagascar that can be recognized using Pauly et al. (2001). For the Indo-Malayan and Australasian region, the only genus-group key currently available is that of Moure (1961), although Deborah Smith (personal communication) is preparing a new exhaustive taxonomic key. Keys to the species of that region are presently only available for some areas (Rasmussen, 2013; Sakagami et al., 1990; Schwarz, 1937, Schwarz, 1939), with additional literature needed for poorly characterized genera, such as Tetragonula. For this genus, keys to the species of continental Asia (Sakagami, 1978) and Australia (Dollin et al., 1997) are better used. No workable key exists for Austroplebeia although a revision is near completion (A Dollin, personal communication). Thus, despite many advances, a significant amount of work remains to be done to fully understand the diversity of stingless bees worldwide. This is necessary to assure that such a taxonomic knowledge is available to the broad group of biologists working with these bees (Gonzalez et al., in press).

The increasing interest in stingless bees during recent years is evident just by looking at the publication rate of scientific papers related to these bees. Figure 1 was prepared by searching during June 2013 in the Thomson Reuters “Web of Science” database of scholarly literature for any topics related to “meliponi*”, “Trigona”, “stingless bee”, or “trigonin*” from 1980 and until 2012. The asterisk retrieves searches of all derivations of a word, e.g., “meliponi*” will locate citations related to Meliponina, Meliponini, Meliponinae, Meliponidae, and Melipona. As observed in the figure, the rise in recorded publications is exponential, with less than 10 papers per year 30 years ago to now close to 120 publications per year. With such an amount of new research being made available almost on a daily basis, it is doubtless important to compile books such as the present one, which will serve as a starting point for all those entering stingless bee research.

Figure 1. Number of scientific papers on stingless bees published each year since 1980 to the present, as recorded by Web of Science.

This edited book consists of 21 chapters, nearly of all them in English but with some in Spanish and Portuguese. The subjects treated in the book are as diverse, as the stingless bees themselves. The book includes contributions on meliponine cultural, medicinal, and educational values, palynology, systematics, foraging behavior, and fossil history. The nutritional, curative and gastronomical values of honey are

particularly interesting aspects covered in this book (chapters 3, 5, 7, 8, 10, 19), as are new recommendations outlining a quality standard for honey and related products which includes that of stingless bees (chapters 16, 17), as well as new methods for honey appreciation through a sensory evaluation (chapter 21)". The importance of this product, the honey and the book, might be much higher than expected. The honey gives stingless bees an important added value besides both crop pollination and ecosystem pollination service. Stingless bee honey is the key product that might contribute to the conservation and preservation of traditional knowledge of stingless bee keeping (and folk medicine), as reported in this volume from Quintana Roo in Mexico (chapter 1) and Brazil (chapter 2). That ancient appreciation of honey as a remedy and the art of keeping colonies required in-depth knowledge of the ecosystem service provided by the bees, i.e., the necessity of pollen and nectar resources from tropical wildlands. Such knowledge is now transformed and modernly presented in environmental education programs, such as from Australia and Brazil, in chapters 6 and 12. In the past, long-term studies of flower visitation were a common practice to identify key plant species for stingless bee foraging. As documented here, this now can be done routinely, by sampling honey and pollen directly from the nest. The diversity and floral preferences of stingless bees can be quantified as proposed in chapter 3, 4 and 9, with chapter 13 explaining the different means of forager recruitment found among these bees. Modern techniques, such as an electronic nose (chapter 18), is a new way to categorize or identify stingless bee honey, thus providing a useful tool in the development and control of quality standards. In addition, the many names proposed for new species by the late JMF Camargo are explained in chapter 14, as well as the geological history of stingless bees, in chapter 15.

We are excited to introduce this new book on stingless bees, which provides an overview of the group and the current status of our knowledge of little-known details with tremendous importance to science and society. The editors and contributors of this book have done a terrific job putting this piece together. We hope that new students and researchers find it stimulating.

References:

Ayala R. 1999. Revisión de las abejas sin aguijon de Mexico (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Meliponini). Folia Entomológica Mexicana 106: 1–123.

Camargo JMF, Pedro SRM. 2003. Meliponini neotropicais: o gênero Partamona Schwarz, 1939 (Hymenoptera, Apidae, Apinae) - bionomia e biogeografia. Revista Brasileira de Entomologia 47: 311–72.

Camargo JMF, Pedro SRM. 2004. Meliponini neotropicais: o gênero Ptilotrigona Moure (Hymenoptera, Apidae, Apinae). Revista Brasileira de Entomologia 48: 353–77.

Camargo JMF, Pedro SRM. 2007. Meliponini In JS Moure, D Urban, GAR Melo, editors. Catalogue of bees (Hymenoptera, Apoidea) in the Neotropical region. pp. 272–578. Sociedade Brasileira de Entomologia; Curitiba (Paraná), Brazil. 1058 pp.

Dollin AE, Dollin LJ, Sakagami SF. 1997. Australian stingless bees of the genus Trigona (Hymenoptera: Apidae). Invertebrate Taxonomy 11: 861–96.

Eardley CD. 2004. Taxonomic revision of the African stingless bees (Apoidea: Apidae: Apinae: Meliponini). African Plant Protection 10: 63–96.

Gonzalez VH, Griswold TL, Engel MS. 2013. Obtaining a better taxonomic understanding of native bees: where do we start? Systematic Entomology (in press).

Gonzalez VH, Roubik DW. 2008. Especies nuevas y filogenia de las abejas de fuego, Oxytrigona (Hymenoptera: Apidae, Meliponini). Acta Zoológica Mexicana (N.S.) 24: 43–71.

Moure JS. 1961. A preliminary supra-specific classification of the old world meliponine bees (Hymenoptera, Apoidea). Studia Entomologica 4: 181–242.

Pauly A, Brooks RW, Nilsson LA, Pesenko YA, Eardley CD, et al. 2001. Hymenoptera Apoidea de Madagascar et des îles voisines. Annales Sciences Zoologiques, Musée Royal de l’Afrique Centrale, Tervuren, Belgique 286: 1–390, 16 pls.

ix

Ramírez SR, Nieh JC, Quental TB, Roubik DW, Imperatriz-Fonseca VL, Pierce NE. 2010. A molecular phylogeny of the stingless bee genus Melipona (Hymenoptera: Apidae). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 56: 519–25.

Rasmussen C. 2008. Catalog of the Indo-Malayan/Australasian stingless bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Meliponini). Zootaxa 1935: 1–80.

Rasmussen C. 2013. Stingless bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Meliponini) of the Indian subcontinent: Diversity, taxonomy and current status of knowledge. Zootaxa 3647: 401–28.

Rasmussen C, Camargo JMF. 2008. A molecular phylogeny and the evolution of nest architecture and behavior in Trigona s.s. (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Meliponini). Apidologie 39: 102–18.

Rasmussen C, Cameron SA. 2007. A molecular phylogeny of the Old World stingless bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Meliponini) and the non-monophyly of the large genus Trigona. Systematic Entomology 32: 26–39.

Rasmussen C, Cameron SA. 2010. Global stingless bee phylogeny supports ancient divergence, vicariance, and long distance dispersal. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 99: 206–32.

Roubik DW. 1992. Stingless bees: a guide to Panamanian and Mesoamerican species and their nests (Hymenoptera: Apidae: Meliponinae). In D Quintero, A Aiello, editors. Insects of Panama and Mesoamerica. pp. 495–524. Oxford University Press; Oxford, UK. 714 pp.

Sakagami SF. 1978. Tetragonula stingless bees of the continental Asia and Sri Lanka (Hymenoptera, Apidae). Journal of the Faculty of Science, Hokkaido University, Series VI, Zoology 21: 165–247. Sakagami SF, Inoue T, Salmah S. 1990. Stingless bees of central Sumatra. In SF Sakagami, R Ohgushi,

DW Roubik, editors. Natural History of social wasps and bees in equatorial Sumatra. pp. 125–37. Hokkaido University Press; Sapporo, Japan. xi + 274 pp. + 8 pl.

Schwarz HF. 1937. Results of the Oxford University Sarawak (Borneo) expedition: Bornean stingless bees of the genus Trigona. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 73: 281–328

Schwarz HF. 1939. The Indo-Malayan species of Trigona. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 76: 83–141.

Silveira FA, Melo GAR, Almeida EAB. 2002. Abelhas Brasileiras sistemática e identificação. FA Silveira, Belo Horizonte, Brazil. 253 pp.

Claus Rasmussen

Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, NyMunkegade, DK-8000 Aarhus C, Denmark

Victor H. Gonzalez

Department of Biological Sciences, Southwestern Oklahoma State University, Weatherford, Oklahoma, USA and Division of Entomology, Natural History Museum, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas 66045, USA

Introduction

The cost of stingless bee keeping is minimal, yet the cost of training persons who know their science and management is considerable, as is that of locating wild nests or communicating with traditional or tribal stingless bee keeping experts. We consider some of these themes in a recent edited book "Pot-honey. A legacy of stingless bees" with many contributors from many countries. Now we have to ask: How far can the exploitation of stingless bees go? For the Western hive bee, Apis mellifera, commercial exploitation is clearly a trade-off. We may watch the documentary “More than Honey” shown in Europe and America in 2013, directed by Marcus Imhoof, and come away with the idea that the honey bee industry is not going to protect bees any more than industries protect cattle, chickens, pigs or sheep. Many are the bees and colonies available, and many die due to management, pesticide and pasturage situations. Yet, they are deemed adequate or “sustainable” to pollinate many crops, in many parts of the world. Sustainable here merely means that the losses are tolerable to humans. Does this serve as a model for stingless bees? No.

We know very well there are still many facets of the bees and their biology that need more. More what? More raw data and information, and more thoughtful, complete syntheses of recent knowledge and tribal practice, belief and application. More sense of the marketability and real sustainability of having certain of the stingless bees become commercially in vogue. More biogeographic information— the result of having a reliable source of taxonomic data—connected to certain environments and native plants, animals, fungi, microbes, etc. We are beginning to appreciate the Meliponini and the all-encompassing story of the largest group of honey-making creatures on earth. They may catch up to and ultimately surpass the legacy and renown of Apis mellifera. Our ‘stinger-less’ honey bees boast over 50 times as many species, and tropical, subtropical and even a few temperate-zone honeys.

The present volume contains 21 chapters with diverse topics written in English, Portuguese and Spanish. It is to be hoped that they clarify stingless bee origins, names, taxonomy, culture, composition, properties, conservation, education and regulation. Several complementary topics found their place in this e-book. Meliponiculture is discussed for Brazil, Mexico and Argentina. Local names of stingless bees inserted in Brazilian songs and poems express a cultural message in the rediscovery of pot-honey. Palynological studies of honey, geopropolis and propolis are tools for approaching the botanical and geographical origin of meliponine products. The need of post-harvest processing for pot-honey is revealed in a detailed chapter on honey maturation practices in Maranhão State, Brazil. Stingless bees also have a place in Australian education, as told to us by a teacher from Alstonville High School, in New South Wales. Systematic reviews on honey treatments for cancer in general, and for the Thai Tetragonula laeviceps pot-honey in cultured cells, are presented. The widespread industrial contaminants of lead and mercury (Pb and Hg) are discussed for pot-honeys from Argentina, Australia, Brazil and Venezuela. Finally, antioxidant activity is evaluated, for the first time, in different components of a stingless bee nest, in a chapter based upon Tetragonisca angustula. An important interphase chapter between stingless bee taxonomists and pot-honey analysts illustrates reasons for shifting or overturning previous classification and identification, with examples from Neotropical bees. The cover images from a scientist fully in awe of Leurotrigona muelleri are presented in a comprehensive chapter named ‘the little pearl’. Foraging specializations carefully condensed as "the fast versus the furious" outline morphological foraging traits and foraging strategies guiding meliponine colony decisions in the choice of food sources, and for making their honey in cerumen pots. The significance of a binary system in the life of a taxonomist who devoted his own life to study Meliponini and name 3 genera and 88 species of stingless bees, connects JMF Camargo with his colleagues forever. Inspiration found in fossils recount the evolutionary history of Meliponini with the ancient Cretotrigona prisca from the Late Cretaceous of New Jersey, USA, contributing to the continuing stingless bee information we are pleased to receive from professor Charles Michener, currently

xi

formulations, its characterization with an electronic nose and the emotional perceptions, whicharequantifiable,

open new avenues to investigate human interactions with this ancient honey.

Actions to showcase the value of pot-honey are given in the final chapter of this e-book as an interactive exercise between Costa Rica and Venezuela, that could embrace tropical initiatives to promote meliponiculture, research and education: 1. VIII Mesoamerican Congress of Native Bees. 2. Route of Meliponini Museums in the World. 3. Sensory evaluation of pot-honey. 4. Evaluation of emotions elicited after consuming pot-honey. 5. A project "One meliponary in each school". 6. Thinking on the volume of the honey reactor the cerumen pot. 7. A book for the most abundant honeys in the forest but less frequent in the market.

We hope that this brief extension of meliponine knowledge will keep the flames burning bright, because the theme is one that will, we believe, illuminate our world on many timely and interesting subjects.

Mérida, Venezuela; Sydney, Australia Patricia Vit

Acknowledgements

Chapters were kindly reviewed by Absy ML, Ayala R, Barth OM, Buratti S, Cova JA, Cuenca M, Dardón MJ, De Jesús R, González I, Gutiérrez L, Halcroft M, Heard TA, Hinojosa-Diaz I, Meccia G, Michener CD, Páez X, Pedro SRW, Rasmussen C, Roig-Alsina A, Rosa CA, Roubik DW, Smith D, Usubillaga A, Vielma RA, Villanueva-Gutiérrez R, Vit P, Yurrita Obiols CL, Zilse G.

All contributors are acknowledged for their team effort to compose this volume, at the time of P Vit'S retirement, leaving a set of avenues through which to explore the enticing enigma of honey.

xiii

Contents

1. Recuperación de saberes y formación para el manejo y conservación de la abeja Melipona beecheii en la Zona Maya de Quintana Roo, México

Villanueva-Gutiérrez R, Colli-Ucán W, Tuz-Novelo M, Gracia MA pp. 1-8

1.2 Meliponicultura y apicultura 1.3 Manejo de Melipona beecheii

1.4 Cursos-talleres sobre meliponicultura 1.4.1 Construcción de meliponarios modelo

1.4.2 Formación de meliponicultores

1.4.3 Acciones para organizar e informar a los meliponicultores 1.5 Reflexiones finales

2. Cultural aspects of meliponiculture

Souza BA, Lopes MTR, Pereira FM pp. 1-6

2.1 Uses of stingless bees in the Americas 2.2 Food and applications

2.3 Cultural and religious expressions 2.4 Source of income

2.5 Songs and poems

2.6 Rediscovery of pot-honey

3. Miel de Scaptotrigona jujuyensis en dos localidades de Formosa, Argentina

Basilio AM, Spagarino C, Landi L, Achával B pp. 1-8

3.1 Mieles de otros meliponinos comunes en Argentina

3.2 Origen floral y características físicoquímicas de miel de S. jujuyensis 3.3 Miel de S. jujuyensis comparada con otras mieles del norte de Argentina 3.4 El recurso botánico utilizado por S. jujuyensis reflejó su generalismo 4. Palynological analysis of Brazilian stingless bee pot-honey

Barth OM, Freitas AS, Almeida-Muradian L, Vit P pp. 1-8

4.1 Palynological analysis of pot-honey samples 4.1.1 The Northern region

4.1.2 The Northeast region

4.1.3 The Southeast and Southern regions 4.2 Honeydew

4.3 Melissopalynological facts

5. Maturation of stingless bee pot-honey: a new frontier in the gastronomical market

Drummond MS pp. 1-9.

5.1 Native bee biodiversity and commerce

5.2 The disturbing impact from the introduction of Apis mellifera in Brazil 5.3 Stingless bee farming for the survival of rural communities

5.5 On the need for regulation and recognition in Brazil and abroad

5.6 Actions to valorize the products of stingless Native Bees and the role of research institutions 5.7 Strategies for commercialization of pot-honey

5.8 Pot-honey production history 5.8.1 The price of stingless bees honey 5.8.2 Assembly of infrastructure 5.8.3 Maintenance and safety costs 5.8.4 Economic weight of production

5.9 The product: the mature pot-honey of the Native Bee Project with Origin Designation. 5.9.1 The maturation of pot-honey

5.9.2 Procedures of maturation of iraina 5.10 State of the art and future development

6. Using stingless bees as an educational tool in Australian schools

Maginnity S pp. 1-4.

6.1 Educational program

6.2 Stingless bees in education in New South Wales 6.3 My teaching experiences

6.4 A bright future for stingless bees in education 6.5 Future endeavours

7. Systematic reviews on interventions with honey in cancer

Vit P, Huq F pp. 1-9

7.1 Systematic reviews for clinical and experimental interventions with honey 7.2 Wound management

7.3 Antiproliferative action of honey in cancer cultured cells 7.4 Apoptotic hallmarks of honey

7.5 Considerations on oncological uses of honey

8. A study of Hg and Pb content in meliponine honey (Apidae: Meliponini) Carrero P, Rondón C, Saavedra AR, Vit P

pp. 1-5

8.1 Mercury and lead in pot-honey 8.1.1 Stingless bee species 8.1.2 Honey samples 8.1.3 Mineralization

8.1.4 Aqueous calibration and standard addition for Hg 8.1.5 Aqueous calibration and standard addition curves for Pb 8.1.6 Accuracy

8.1.7 Analytical characteristics to validate Hg determination 8.1.8 Analytical characteristics to validate Pb determination 8.1.9 Analytical results for mercury and lead content

8.2 Interpretation of mercury and lead values

9. Pollen analysis of geopropolis and propolis from stingless bees

Freitas AS, Vit P, Barth OM 1-7 pp.

9.1 Composition, pharmacological activity and quality control 9.2 Palynological methods for geopropolis and propolis 9.3 Palynological analysis of geopropolis and propolis 9.4 Conclusions

10. Antioxidant activity of nest products of Tetragonisca angustula from Mérida, Venezuela

Pérez-Pérez EM, Suárez E, Peña-Vera MJ, Vit P 1-6 pp.

xv

10.1.1 Stingless bee products

10.1.2 Total antioxidant activity determination by the ABTS+• 10.1.3 Analytical methods

10.2 Relationship of antioxidant activity to total polyphenol content 10.3 Pot-honey and propolis antioxidant activity

10.4 Antioxidant activity of honey pots, nest cerumen and entrance cerumen

11. Why they keep changing the names of our stingless bees (Hymenoptera: Apidae; Meliponini): a little history and guide to taxonomy

Roubik DW

1-7 pp.

11.1 Tracking down species 11.2 The ghost of taxonomy past

11.3 The present future of stingless bee taxonomy 11.4 Microscopic approaches yield macroscopic results

12. Leurotrigona muelleri, a pequena pérola entre as abelhas sem ferrão

Mateus S, Menezes C, Vollet-Neto A

1-9 pp.

12.1 Uso de abelhas sem ferrão para educação ambiental 12.2 Distribuição geográfica de Leurotrigona muelleri 12.3 Arquitetura do ninho e biologia geral

12.4 Produção das células de cria e de novos indivíduos 12.5 Sistema de produção de rainhas

12.6 Ciclo biológico das colônias 12.7 Predadores

12.8 Transferência de ninhos

12.9 Caixas especiais para observação

13. The fast versus the furious – On competition, morphological foraging traits, and foraging strategies in stingless bees

Hrncir M, Maia-Silva C pp. 1-13

13.1 Competition for food, survival, and reproduction

13.2 The fundamental food niche – resource use in the absence of competitors 13.2.1 Bees and flowers – mutualism and conflict

13.2.2 Spatio-temporal partitioning of food sources

13.3 The realized food niche – resource exploitation in the presence of competitors 13.3.1 Mass-flowering foraging bonanzas – a good reason for competition 13.3.2 Competition for food and foraging strategies in stingless bees

13.3.2.1 The fast – success through "first come, first served" strategy 13.3.2.2 The furious – success through dominance at a feeding site 13.3.2.3 The insinuators – success through persistence

13.3.2.4 The gleaners – success through cleaning up the leftovers 13.4 Concluding remarks

14. Etimología de abejas sin aguijón (Meliponini) nombradas por el Profesor JMF Camargo solo o asociado Vit P

1-7 pp.

14.1 Nombrar tres géneros y 88 especies de abejas sin aguijón

14.2 Etimologías de 91 taxones nuevos nombrados por JMF Camargo

14.2.1 Taxones nuevos reseñados en el capítulo Meliponini (Camargo y Pedro, 2007) 14.2.2 Especies nuevas reseñadas on-line en la actualización (Camargo y Pedro, 2012) 14.3 Síntesis cronológica y de coautores de los 91 taxones de Meliponini nombrados por Camargo 14.4 Entomología y bromatología de mieles

15. Geological History of the Stingless Bees (Apidae: Meliponini) Engel MS, Michener CD 1-7 pp. 15.1 Cretaceous (145–65.5 mya) 15.2 Paleogene (65.5–23 mya) 15.3 Neogene (23 mya–today) 15.4 Concluding remarks

16. Proposta de regulamento técnico de qualidade físico-química do mel floral processado produzido por abelhas do gênero Melipona

Carvalho CAL, Alves RMO, Souza BA, Véras SO, Alves EM, Sodré GS 1-9 pp.

16.1 Padrão para mel de meliponíneos

16.2 Biodiversidade de méis de pote Neotropicais

16.3 Proposta de regulamento técnico de qualidade do mel processado (refrigerado ou desumidificado) de abelhas do gênero Melipona

17. Modificaciones comentadas de la norma Miel de Abejas, hacia la norma Miel de Venezuela: Inclusión de miel de pote y exclusión de mieles falsas

Vit P 1-8 pp.

17.1 Requisitos propuestos para miel de Melipona favosa 17.2 Norma venezolana para la miel comentada

17.3 Beneficios de la norma modificada

17.4 Avances con otras especies de abejas nativas productoras de miel en Venezuela 17.5 Inclusión futura de la melisopalinología en la norma de miel

17.6 Permitir el uso de la palabra 'miel' sólo en etiquetas de miel genuina

18. Perfil aromático y contenido de humedad como parámetros discriminantes para la clasificación quimiométrica de mieles de pote de diferentes especies de Meliponini

Zuluaga-Domínguez CM, Vit P, Drummond MS, Díaz-Moreno AC, Quicazán MC

1-8 pp.

18.1 Análisis del perfil aromático

18.2 Análisis estadístico por redes neuronales

18.3 Humedad y perfil aromático de mieles de pote por nariz electrónica 18.4 Sensores de compuestos alcohólicos y azufrados

19. Cosmetic properties of honey. 1. Antioxidant activity

Isla M, Cordero A, Díaz L, Pérez-Pérez EM, Vit P

1-8 pp.

19.1 Topic use of honey through history

19.2 Cutaneous interventions with honey and honey products 19.3 Polyphenol contents of honey

19.4 Antioxidant activity as a functional property of honey 19.4.1 Antioxidant activity by the DPPH method 19.4.2 Total antioxidant activity by the TEAC method 19.5 Stability tests

19.6 Honey toxicity

20. Aceptación y perfil emocional de mieles genuinas y falsas de Apis mellifera y Melipona favosa

Vit P 1-10 pp.

20.1 Presentación de emociones individuales 20.2 Selección de mieles

20.3 Evaluación emocional y aceptación 20.3.1 Asesores

xvii

20.3.3 Aceptación

20.4 Comparación de cuatro mieles

20.5 Comparación de dos mieles de Apis mellifera, genuina y falsa 20.6 Propuesta de emociones agrupadas

20.7 Contexto de los mensajes en la miel 21. Acciones para valorizar la miel de pote

Aguilar I, Herrera E, Vit P 1-13 pp.

21.1 Sinopsis de actividades y secciones del VIII Congreso Mesoamericano de Abejas Nativas 21.2 Ruta de Museos Vivientes de Meliponinos en el Mundo

21.3 Evaluación sensorial 21.4 Evaluación de emociones

21.5 Proyecto “Un meliponario en cada escuela”

21.6 Pensando en el volumen del reactor de miel: el pote de cerumen

21.7 Un libro para las mieles más abundantes de la selva, aunque más escasas en el mercado.

Vit P & Roubik DW, eds. Stingless bees process honey and pollen in cerumen pots. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioanálisis, Universidad de Los Andes; Mérida, Venezuela.